Illustration by Kagan McLeod for The National
Illustration by Kagan McLeod for The National

First among the Bee Gees, Barry Gibb is now the last man standing



In early 1975, Barry Gibb, songwriter extraordinaire for The Bee Gees, was worried. Though he could always look back on chart toppers such as Massachusetts and How Can You Mend A Broken Heart, the magic seemed to be running out. The Bee Gees hadn't had a top 20 album in six years, and just one single had tickled the higher reaches of the charts. "We were fairly dead in the water at that point ... we needed something new," he once told The New Yorker.
Even Barry could not have foreseen the sheer magnitude of what he and brothers Maurice and Robin would achieve with their change of direction. Barry began singing in his distinctive falsetto and, combining disco's funky, dance-floor-orientated sounds with the emotional poise of their classic pop songwriting, they produced the biggest-selling album of the time within just two years. Jive Talkin', How Deep Is Your Love, Stayin' Alive, Night Fever ... the hits kept coming.
But as Barry said himself in an interview with The Daily Telegraph in 2009, none of this would have been possible without his little brother Robin, who died this week. "Other people can't get in there, it's our own little world," he said of their songwriting process. "We couldn't do a job when someone else was in the room. Robin and I love each other, we still love making music together."
All of which makes Barry Gibb's status as the last remaining Bee Gee - Robin's twin brother Maurice died in 2003 - all the more sad. Thankfully, the intense fraternal rivalry which characterised the power struggle in the band had dissipated by Robin's death but, in a way, it was crucial to their success: Robin believed it actually spurred Barry on in their glory years. It was somehow telling that, after their family - brothers Andy, Robin and Maurice and sister Lesley - emigrated from Manchester to Australia in the late 1950s, their first Australian record was somewhat pointedly called The Bee Gees Sing And Play 14 Barry Gibb Songs. There was no doubt who was in charge here - not least because the band was then called Barry Gibb and The Bee Gees.
Robin was only 16 at the time - although it didn't take long for the rivalry to coalesce into something more troubling. As their first hits began to stack up in the mid-to-late 1960s, Barry was undoubtedly cast as the pin-up leader of the group, even though Robin was just as prolific a writer and often the lead singer.
It mattered little that Ahmet Ertegun, the founder of their first American distributor, Atlantic Records, was bowled away by their "most beautiful voices, unlike anything I had ever heard: beautiful clarity and a lot of feeling. It was the sound of brothers''. By 1969, when the choice had to be made between a Barry song and a Robin song for a new single release, Barry, in combination with Bee Gees' manager Robert Stigwood, won the day - enough to prompt Robin to temporarily leave the band.
"It was restricting writing for the Bee Gees but I enjoyed it until they began to judge what I was doing. I'm not going to be judged," he said at the time. The "they" in question was clear. Barry vision for The Bee Gees was determinedly singular.
The timing of Robin's exit was interesting. The 1960s incarnation of The Bee Gees produced Beatles-esque pop, string-drenched soul (the beautiful Massachusetts), and meaningful ballads (I've Gotta Get A Message To You). But Odessa, the 1969 album from which the arguments stemmed, was Barry Gibb's attempt at that most tricky of musical statements, the rock opera concept album.
Listen to it now, and it sounds as brilliantly bonkers as it did then. There are country and western songs, flamenco, bluegrass and a blast of Baa Baa Black Sheep. It's become a curio in their career - not least because it completely flopped. But with hindsight, it says more about Barry Gibb's never-ending quest for pop perfection than the disco numbers that would follow. It revealed an adaptable songwriter who wasn't constrained by genre.
As Barry said himself in The Guardian when Odessa was re-released in 2009: "Our music became so speckled because we had all these insane influences from growing up in Australia. Then we were five weeks at sea going to Australia, five weeks at sea coming back. We'd been inside the Pyramids, been to India, up the Suez Canal, in the Sahara Desert.
"I really think that has a lot to do with our songwriting, these strange songs, unusual lyrics and abstractions."
Perhaps this explains how comfortable Barry was writing disco songs after the fallow years of the early 1970s. Or perhaps the careerist in him noted the opportunity after the promptings of his manager. Certainly, "going disco" wasn't a wholly creative decision inspired by their love of the dance floor: Robin and Barry admitted that they'd never danced - essentially the whole point of disco.
So while some excitable commentators after Robin's death have rushed to say that Bee Gees invented disco, it's more accurate to say they unwittingly took it to the mainstream. And in doing so, they changed the face of pop music forever - the notion of club music being refined and repackaged for the charts began with The Bee Gees. Robin's admission that Barry hadn't heard of disco - "we thought we were just writing pop songs you could dance to" - probably makes a lot of sense.
And a lot of people danced to them. By the time of Saturday Night Fever, in which John Travolta memorably boogied to the likes of Stayin' Alive and MoreThan A Woman, The Bee Gees were massive. And they dived right into that success - for all their subsequent protests that they preferred wearing jeans and T-shirts, the enduring image of Barry Gibb is those sparkly disco jumpsuits, unbuttoned far too low for comfort. It was groundbreaking; Saturday Night Fever being the first real occasion where fashion, film and music all coalesced into one culture-hogging whole. From late December 1977 until mid-May 1978, Barry Gibb-penned songs were No. 1 in the US for all but three weeks. During that run of success, the Bee Gees beat Lennon and McCartney's record of three consecutive No. 1s in the US. Barry was riding a wave of acclaim and popularity - and if that meant wearing medallions and shiny polyester, so be it.
Naturally, such familiarity in the end bred contempt for disco. It came swiftly and harshly, radio stations promoting Bee Gee Free Weekends and a hugely oversubscribed "disco demolition night" in Chicago, where a huge crate of disco records was blown up in the middle of a baseball field. As disco's biggest stars, The Bee Gees were doomed.
And yet, ironically, Barry's subsequent decision to concentrate on collaborating with and writing for other pop acts meant that songs sounding like The Bee Gees were still successful. In the early 1980s, Barbra Streisand hit the top of the charts with Woman In Love, Dionne Warwick's comeback single Heartbreaker was a massive success and Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers recorded Islands In The Stream. Chain Reaction, by Diana Ross, was one of the greatest hits of 1985.
Barry was, essentially, knocking out big songs for big stars. And though The Bee Gees themselves had some success with the Barry Gibb-penned You Win Again in 1987, One in 1989 and the Chain Reaction-aping Secret Love in 1991, the game was essentially up. Which is not to say their audience deserted them - the penultimate studio album, 1997's Still Waters, sold over 5 million copies worldwide. But old age was doing them no favours. Barry was suffering from back and arthritis problems, and the "pop songs you could dance to" were being written by young, cool hipsters, not 50 year-olds with beards. When Maurice died suddenly in 2003 (Andy, who had gone on to a solo career after moving back to England in 1967, died in 1988 at the age of 30), Barry withdrew from being a Bee Gee to such an extent that he barely spoke to Robin for five years. "A shock like that either brings everybody together or scatters everybody, and in our family it scattered everyone," he said.
Barry's attempts to connect with the "heritage" industry that has treated The Rolling Stones, Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan so kindly have always been hamstrung somewhat by the suggestion that, via those jumpsuits and the cheesy image of disco, The Bee Gees were somehow not a serious concern. Barry has ended up doing bits and pieces of television work and tested out a first US solo gig this February.
Still, he can always comfort himself with the knowledge that The Guinness Book of Records states there is only one more successful songwriter in history - and he's a Beatle. And, just maybe, a comforting by-product of Robin's death will be the reappraisal of the Bee Gees' pre-disco work, too. As Elton John said to his Caesar's Palace crowd just this week: "The Bee Gees were part of my life when I was growing up; they were a huge influence on me as a songwriter". Elton John, and many, many more.

Milestones on the road to union

1970

October 26: Bahrain withdraws from a proposal to create a federation of nine with the seven Trucial States and Qatar. 

December: Ahmed Al Suwaidi visits New York to discuss potential UN membership.

1971

March 1:  Alex Douglas Hume, Conservative foreign secretary confirms that Britain will leave the Gulf and “strongly supports” the creation of a Union of Arab Emirates.

July 12: Historic meeting at which Sheikh Zayed and Sheikh Rashid make a binding agreement to create what will become the UAE.

July 18: It is announced that the UAE will be formed from six emirates, with a proposed constitution signed. RAK is not yet part of the agreement.

August 6:  The fifth anniversary of Sheikh Zayed becoming Ruler of Abu Dhabi, with official celebrations deferred until later in the year.

August 15: Bahrain becomes independent.

September 3: Qatar becomes independent.

November 23-25: Meeting with Sheikh Zayed and Sheikh Rashid and senior British officials to fix December 2 as date of creation of the UAE.

November 29:  At 5.30pm Iranian forces seize the Greater and Lesser Tunbs by force.

November 30: Despite  a power sharing agreement, Tehran takes full control of Abu Musa. 

November 31: UK officials visit all six participating Emirates to formally end the Trucial States treaties

December 2: 11am, Dubai. New Supreme Council formally elects Sheikh Zayed as President. Treaty of Friendship signed with the UK. 11.30am. Flag raising ceremony at Union House and Al Manhal Palace in Abu Dhabi witnessed by Sheikh Khalifa, then Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi.

December 6: Arab League formally admits the UAE. The first British Ambassador presents his credentials to Sheikh Zayed.

December 9: UAE joins the United Nations.

Company%20profile
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
 
Started: 2020
 
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
 
Based: Dubai, UAE
 
Sector: Entertainment 
 
Number of staff: 210 
 
Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EKinetic%207%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202018%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounder%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Rick%20Parish%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Abu%20Dhabi%2C%20UAE%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Clean%20cooking%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%2410%20million%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Self-funded%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Points to remember
  • Debate the issue, don't attack the person
  • Build the relationship and dialogue by seeking to find common ground
  • Express passion for the issue but be aware of when you're losing control or when there's anger. If there is, pause and take some time out.
  • Listen actively without interrupting
  • Avoid assumptions, seek understanding, ask questions

Juliet, Naked
Dir: Jesse Peretz
Starring: Chris O'Dowd, Rose Byrne, Ethan Hawke​​​​​​​
​​​​​​​Two stars

The Sand Castle

Director: Matty Brown

Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea

Rating: 2.5/5

Red Joan

Director: Trevor Nunn

Starring: Judi Dench, Sophie Cookson, Tereza Srbova

Rating: 3/5 stars

Emergency

Director: Kangana Ranaut

Stars: Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahima Chaudhry 

Rating: 2/5

A little about CVRL

Founded in 1985 by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, the Central Veterinary Research Laboratory (CVRL) is a government diagnostic centre that provides testing and research facilities to the UAE and neighbouring countries.

One of its main goals is to provide permanent treatment solutions for veterinary related diseases. 

The taxidermy centre was established 12 years ago and is headed by Dr Ulrich Wernery. 

THE APPRENTICE

Director: Ali Abbasi

Starring: Sebastian Stan, Maria Bakalova, Jeremy Strong

Rating: 3/5

TOUCH RULES

Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.

Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.

Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.

A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.

After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.

At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.

A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.

The specs

Engine: 3-litre twin-turbo V6

Power: 400hp

Torque: 475Nm

Transmission: 9-speed automatic

Price: From Dh215,900

On sale: Now

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding
Game Changer

Director: Shankar 

Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram

Rating: 2/5

The Bio

Hometown: Bogota, Colombia
Favourite place to relax in UAE: the desert around Al Mleiha in Sharjah or the eastern mangroves in Abu Dhabi
The one book everyone should read: 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It will make your mind fly
Favourite documentary: Chasing Coral by Jeff Orlowski. It's a good reality check about one of the most valued ecosystems for humanity

The specs
 
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo
Power: 398hp from 5,250rpm
Torque: 580Nm at 1,900-4,800rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto
Fuel economy, combined: 6.5L/100km
On sale: December
Price: From Dh330,000 (estimate)
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
 
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
 
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
 
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
 
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
Living in...

This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.

How to protect yourself when air quality drops

Install an air filter in your home.

Close your windows and turn on the AC.

Shower or bath after being outside.

Wear a face mask.

Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.

If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.

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